Read more: www.commonweal.scot/articles/mag...

“The right is winning becasue it has a vision for the future - even if that vision is more like the past.”

“Starmer and Macron are both determined to use 30-year-old orthodoxies to address crises that were created by those orthodoxies.”

“The role of liberals has become to prevent the future altogether, to sustain the present forever.”

Robin McAlpine says we are stuck with a vision of the future that is really a vision of the past because liberals only ever live in the present.

“Free speech comes with duties and responsibilities, it is not a blank cheque.”

Read more: www.thenational.scot/politics/254...

“By insisting free speech must be absolute, Farage sets up a false choice: either say nothing at all, or say anything without consequences.”

Megan Davidson says in @scotnational.bsky.social democracy doesn’t live in absolutes and the far right are painting free speech as an issue of black and white.

“You cannot blockade a people forever without also blockading the conscience of the world.”

Read more: www.commonweal.scot/articles/mag...

“Israel cares desperately about appearances. It wants international audiences to nod along with its story of ‘security’.”

Megan Davidson writes in @scotnational.bsky.social on the need to maintain solidarity with the people of Palestine 🍉🕊️

“65% of young voters say they’re likely to vote when the time comes & 60% agree that voting is a duty once the right is extended. They aren’t lazy or disengaged by nature. They’re just being failed by a system that’s supposed to prepare them.”

Read more: www.commonweal.scot/articles/you...

“Stuck in a limbo of financial precarity, half-adult-half independent, how do you feel empowered, still living in a teenage-like bubble?”

“Schools teach young people how to manage money, not how to influence the systems that shape their lives.”

Megan Davidson says politics is alienating for young people, and their exploitation for rent and lack of job prospects fuels this alienation.

“A much better approach to transforming our homes for the green economy would start not with the fossil fuel companies and what they want but by coming to the other side and looking at homes first.”

www.commonweal.scot/articles/mag...

“We’d be better designing and retrofitting homes to minimise their total energy needs.”

“The problem with that logic is that carbon capture and storage doesn’t work.”

Dr Craig Dalzell asks why John Swinney is defending unclean blue hydrogen and carbon capture and storage.

“Encouraging conscientiousness is not just about raising better employees, students, or citizens - it is about cultivating the conditions for trust, reliability, and collective wellbeing.”

Read more: www.commonweal.scot/articles/the...

“Restoring conscientiousness is not about punishment or control; it is about giving young people the skills, habits, and expectations that allow them to succeed and contribute meaningfully to society.”

Megan Davidson says a society without conscientious citizens faces an erosion of social cohesion.

“The economy needs to be rebalanced towards patience and long-term security rather than grabbing a quick buck.”

Read in full: www.commonweal.scot/articles/mag...

“Pensioner poverty rates have been static for the past 20 years and the rest of us face a future of having neither enough savings nor even enough capital wealth from inflated house prices to sustain ourselves.”

“An average British worker now retires with something like 11 different pension pots spread over 9 different pension providers.”

Dr Craig Dalzell: How the “Me First” pensions make the UK’s debt more expensive.

“There is a quiet English materialist nationalism which Starmer would do well to place emphasis on rather than overt flag-waving.”

Read @scotnational article in full: www.thenational.scot/news/2551071...

“Ditching arbitrary fiscal rules for a public-led investment approach would support a renewed emphasis on colleges and apprenticeships and provide the renewal this flailing government so seeks.”

“We have a huge skills shortage in filling the roles needed for a just transition of any value.”

“If you were pinning your electoral hopes on winning over this ‘manosphere-adjacent’ demographic, I would start with non-university career paths.”